Plastic material sanitary appliances are destined to replace traditional metal or ceramic sanitary appliances which have a high cost and a limited life.
The plastic material used today, comprising natural products, constitutes a composite mineral material. The manufactured product must therefore have high quality when applied, for instance, to a sink which must have a considerable impact resistance, since it is used with heavy and varied metal kitchen utensils. The surface of a sink should have abrasion resistance and mechanical strength.
Bearing in mind its environment, the sink must also remain extremely stable in contact with water and must not allow attack by the various domestic products. The material in use must also have good sound and thermal insulating properties.
Products now being manufactured show considerable disadvantages with regard to mechanical strength and stability in contact with water. The material in use does not allow products to be made in a perfectly uniform and an easily moulded manner at high temperature and under high pressure.
Materials are known based on thermosetting resin and mineral fillers, already used in the production of sanitary appliances. In the composition of known moulding materials, a non-saturated polyester-type resin is dissolved in a mixture of liquid monomers comprising, for instance, a vinyl group. A non-shrink thermoplastic is also known, which is active during the co-polymerization of the resin and of the monomer. An organic peroxide catalyst is also used to trigger the resin cross-linking.
It is also known for the compositions in use to utilize reinforcement fibers such as glass fibers, to ensure the rigidity of cross-linked material. Since these products are moulded at high temperature and under high pressure, a mould parting agent with known properties such as calcium and zinc stearate is utilized.
Fillers contained in the known resin are made up, more particularly, of silica and they do not include calcium carbonate.
It has been found that the use of calcium carbonate under certain conditions could, on the contrary, allow very good quality sanitary appliances to be obtained under certain conditions namely with a good resistance to abrasion and water.
If calcium carbonate in the form of marble with or without coating pigmentation is used, in combination with glass beads, it allows an unexpected effect to be achieved. This effect is the deterioration of fiberglass normally introduced to obtain the rigidity of cross-linked material.